Abhinaya Dance Company of San Jose - Ensemble: Other Dancers

Rasika Kumar

Rasika Kumar is the daughter of Mythili Kumar and has been her student since 1987. She has performed in many of Abhinaya Dance Company’s productions, including Vande Mataram – Mother I bow to thee in 1997. Since her arangetram in 1996, Rasika has toured with Abhinaya and has performed nattuvangam as well. Rasika is a graduate of the Massachusetts Insitute of Technology, where she was the president of Natya – M.I.T’s classical dance club. In December 2004, she gave several performances in the music and dance festival in Chennai, India.

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Malavika Kumar

Malavika Kumar is the daughter of Mythili Kumar and has performed in many of Abhinaya Dance Company's productions since 1992. She has also toured with the company to India and around the U.S.A. She has performed nattuvangam for the company in numerous performances and was lauded by a critic as 'the star of the show' for her 'precise, well-intoned nattuvangam' in a performance in Chennai. Since 2006, she has been choreographing solo pieces for performance by arangetram students. She is studying law at UC Davis.

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Preeti Vissa

Preeti Vissa has been learning Bharatanatyam from Mythili Kumar for over ten years. During this time, she has participated in a number of Abhinaya productions, such as Revelations, The Life of Annamacharya, Mayiladum Alagan, and The Power of Saturn. She performed her arangetram in April 1999. Preeti performed with the company in the Yuva Festival in Los Angeles, and in Chennai, India. She is an undergraduate student at UCLA.

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Sharada Moorthy Sripadam

Sharada Moorthy Sripadam has studied with Guru Adyar Lakshman and had her arangetram in 1976. She has participated in fund-raisers for the Hindu Temple Livermore since 1989, and has been a teacher and company member for Abhinaya since 1991. She participated in Abhinaya collaborative performance with San Jose Taiko in 1993 and recently in Abhinaya's performance of Kutrala Kuravanji in May 2004 and Timeless Traditions in November 2004.

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Madhav Vissa

Madhav Vissa has been learning Bharatanatyam for over ten years and performed his arangetram in January 2002. He has toured with the company to India in 2003, to the Yuva Festival in Los Angeles, and to Boise, Idaho in 2004. In 2007, he toured with the company to New York and New Jersey and danced in the SF Ethnic Dance Festival. He has also performed nattuvangam for Abhinaya's Fall 2006 performance series, and in New York in 2007. He is an undergraduate student at UC Berkeley.

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Swati Buch

Swati Buch (Arangetram - September 2002) has been participating in Abhinaya Dance Company productions for several years, and helps train students at the Fremont branch for Abhinaya Dance Company. She has toured with the company to Lansing, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Idaho

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Anjana Dasu

Anjana Dasu performed her arangetram in 2005 after training with Abhinaya for over seven years. She has been actively performing in Abhinaya's productions since then and has assisted in training students towards their arangetrams. She performed recently at the SF Ethnic Dance festival and toured with the company to New York and New Jersey. She was praised by a critic as .exquisite. for her performance in Abhinaya's 2007 fall production. She is a sophomore at UC Berkeley.

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Vaibhavi Umesh

Vaibhavi started her training in Bharatanatyam in 1994 under Mythili Kumar. She relocated to India where she continued her training and performed her arangetram in July 2004 under Guru Bhanumathi's direction in Bangalore. She returned to the Bay Area and performed in Abhinaya's 2004 fall concert, Timeless Traditions.

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Yatrika Ajaya

Yatrika Ajaya has participated actively in several community events and in Abhinaya productions since 1999. She is a regular performer in schools through Young Audiences of the Bay Area along with Mythili Kumar. She also performed in the Yuva Festival in Los Angeles in 2004. She had the opportunity to train with visiting guru Sri. C.V. Chandrasekhar and performed his choreography in the fall 2006 production of Ritu Samharam. She presented her arangetram to great acclaim in August 2007. She also teaches classes for Abhinaya.

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Anjali Thakkar

Anjali Thakkar performed her arangetram in 2006 after training with Abhinaya for over ten years. Anjali has performed in numerous community events, demonstrations, and fundraisers and in several of Abhinaya.s productions since 2000. She toured with the company to the Yuva Festival in Los Angeles in 2004. She has been teaching younger students at Abhinaya for a few years and will be graduating from high school in 2008.

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Sushma Umesh

Sushma Umesh performed her arangetram in 2006 after training for ten years. She has participated actively in community events and in Abhinaya productions since 2001, including the fall 2006 production of Ritu Samharam, and the fall 2007 production of Prithvi- the Earth. She assists in teaching classes for younger students and will be graduating from high school in 2008.

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Neeraja Venkat

Neeraja Venkat has trained in Bharatanatyam for five years and performed her arangetram in February 2007. She has participated in several productions since 2004 such as Poetry n Motion, Timeless Traditions, and Ritu Samharam. She performed recently at the San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival and in Abhinaya.s touring production of Gandhi-the Mahatma and Jagriti in New York and New Jersey. She is a freshman at UC Berkeley.

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Pooja Sohoni

Pooja Sohoni performed her arangetram in August 2007 after training for nine years. She has participated in many Abhinaya student recitals and company productions and looks forward to teaching the younger girls at Abhinaya.

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